Directed Movement at Ancient Maya Centers

Author(s): Angela Keller

Year: 2019

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Manifesting Movement Materially: Broadening the Mesoamerican View" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Is there a right way to enter a Maya center? A correct order to the viewing and experiencing of the place? How did the physical act of moving through a center inform the understanding of that place, its leaders, oneself? This paper presents the results of several seasons of fieldwork at the Belizean sites of Xunantunich and Actuncan, which was focused on the identification of site access, flow patterns, and plaza use as these illustrate site planning strategies to attract, entertain, and control a large populace. My work has combined extensive structural excavations with rapid systematic data collection, soil chemistry, macro- and micro-artifact analysis, remote sensing, and targeted excavations. One of the guiding themes for this work has been movement. People moving into, out of, and through site centers. By focusing on architecturally directed movement as a problem to be solved, fragmentary plaster floors, unimpressive alignments of stone, subtle soil chemistry variations, and artifact patterning combine to let us see movement as a significant activity in its own right.

Cite this Record

Directed Movement at Ancient Maya Centers. Angela Keller. Presented at The 84th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Albuquerque, NM. 2019 ( tDAR id: 451792)

Spatial Coverage

min long: -94.197; min lat: 16.004 ; max long: -86.682; max lat: 21.984 ;

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25685